Another Convention, Another Casey

Catholic Sen.
Bob Casey Jr., D-Pa., is scheduled to speak at the Democratic Party’s 2008
convention. But there’s still time. He can, and should, back out.

The Democratic hierarchy has come to
learn the hard way that the party is losing presidential elections because
pro-lifers view it as the party of abortion. This is a well-earned reputation,
one that has sent literally millions of pro-life Democrats to the Republican
presidential ticket year after year.

Seeing the difference that so-called
“values voters” — the pro-life, churchgoing evangelicals and Catholics — made
for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, the Democratic Party has launched a
concerted push.

Those voters could not bring
themselves to vote for Sen. John Kerry, D-Ma., in 2004, who happened to be a
Roman Catholic with a perfect 100% rating from the abortion lobby. In turn, the
Democratic leadership, notably Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and “pro-choice
Catholic” U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., began seeking pro-life Democrats
who could challenge and unseat pro-life Republicans in Congress.

The most stunning example of this
was the trouncing of Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., by Bob Casey Jr. in 2006, costing
pro-lifers their single best fighter in the U.S. Senate.

Since
then, those victorious pro-life Democrats have been marginalized, dispatched to
the wilderness by the party that used them to win the Senate and House, where
they can push an “abortion rights” agenda. The likes of Casey have let
themselves be used over and over.

Now, in the 2008 presidential race,
the Democrats have an even bigger problem with the abortion issue. Sen. Barack
Obama, D-Ill., is so extreme on abortion — voting in his state against medical
care for babies who survive abortions — that he makes Kerry look moderate. For
the Democratic leadership, this problem this time around is unnerving because
conservative Christians are by and large not thrilled with Sen. John McCain,
R-Ariz., the Republican nominee.

In other words, had it not been for
Obama’s abortion extremism, this might otherwise be the Democrats’ year to win
just enough of those “values voters” to take back the White House. And yet,
Obama will not change his position on abortion at all, which is truly sacred
ground for him. He made a vow to Planned Parenthood that his first action as
president would be to sign a federal Freedom of Choice Act, wiping off the
books state and local laws regulating abortion.

The best that Obama can do is to try
to soften his rhetoric, to change his tone on the issue — rhetorical overtures
at which he excels as a polished speaker and appeals to the emotions of people.
The adjustment will be purely one of image, not substance. Here, Casey has already
lent a hand: When Obama was campaigning in Pennsylvania during the Democratic
primary in April, where he lost to Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., by double
digits, he brought along the state’s pro-life Democratic senator. Casey was
there, unflinching, when, at Messiah College in Grantham, Obama refused to
concede that life begins at conception, and when, in Greensburg, he expressed
his dismay at how he would hate to see his daughters “punished by a baby” if
they got pregnant out of wedlock. The “hope” of the Obama campaign is that the
association with the presence of the likes of Casey will help change the
perspective of Obama as the most extreme abortion advocate ever to lead a
ticket.

But, alas, that wasn’t enough during
the Pennsylvania primary in April — and it will not be enough nationally in
November. As a result, someone in the Democratic National Committee has hatched
a truly brilliant scheme: Obama talks tolerance, openness, newness, change,
diversity. So did Bill and Hillary Clinton, but at the 1992 Democratic
Convention, they infamously blocked pro-life Catholic Gov. Robert P. Casey —
the late father of the current senator — from speaking. It was a troubling,
telltale rejection of a good, principled man, an accurate reflection of a party
closed to the pro-life perspective.

This time around, for the 2008
convention, someone has apparently floated the ingenious, Machiavellian idea of
inviting the junior Casey to speak. In turn, the liberal press will run with
the strategy, heralding the overture as a new day for a new, tolerant attitude
for “abortion rights” by the new, tolerant Obama campaign.

As
for Casey, he once again seems dutifully willing to play the role of sucker. In
fact, this leads one to wonder if Obama had made the suggestion to Casey back in
April as a way of winning his endorsement, of taking it away from Hillary
Clinton — one of those Clintons who snubbed Casey’s father back in 1992.

Either way, Casey candidly hopes
that Obama will use him. “I want to do whatever it takes to get him [Obama]
over the goal line.”

The goal line to which Casey is
referring is not the goal of stopping abortion, or requiring medical care for
abandoned, abortion-surviving babies slowly dying of a lack of medical care —
but, rather, electing Barack Obama president of the United States, where Obama
would deliberately work against each and every pro-life conviction of Casey and
his late father.

It isn’t too late for Casey to just
say No. He should tell party leaders that when the party is ready to get
serious about a general change in substance on abortion, not mere rhetoric or
appearance, then he will talk at their convention, but, until then, he is not
their useful idiot — and neither are those pro-life Pennsylvanians who voted
for him.

Paul Kengor is professor of political science at Grove
City College and author of God and Hillary Clinton (HarperCollins,
2007) and The Judge (Ignatius Press, 2007).

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